Data from: Venus flytrap rarely traps its pollinators

Because carnivorous plants rely on arthropods as pollinators and prey, they risk consuming would-be mutualists. We examined this potential conflict in the Venus flytrap (Dionaea muscipula), whose pollinators were previously unknown. Diverse arthropods from two classes and nine orders visited flowers; 56% of visitors carried D. muscipula pollen, often mixed with pollen of co-flowering species. Within this diverse, generalized community, certain bee and beetle species appear to be the most important pollinators, based on their abundance, pollen load size, and pollen fidelity. D. muscipula prey spanned four invertebrate classes and eleven orders; spiders, beetles, and ants were most common. At the family and species levels, few taxa were shared between traps and flowers, yielding a near-zero value of niche overlap for these potentially competing structures. Spatial separation of traps and flowers may contribute to partitioning the invertebrate community between nutritional and reproductive functions in D. muscipula.

由于食肉植物既依赖节肢动物作为传粉者，又将其作为猎物，因此存在误食潜在互利生物的风险。我们在捕蝇草（Dionaea muscipula）中研究了这一潜在冲突，此前其传粉者尚未被探明。共有来自2纲、9目的多样节肢动物造访其花朵；其中56%的访客携带有捕蝇草花粉，这些花粉常与同期开花植物的花粉混合存在。在这一多样且泛化的节肢动物群落中，基于物种的丰度、花粉装载量以及花粉保真度，部分蜂类与甲虫类物种堪称最为关键的传粉者。捕蝇草的猎物涵盖4个无脊椎动物纲、11个目，其中蜘蛛、甲虫与蚂蚁最为常见。在科与物种分类层级上，捕虫夹与花朵的共现分类群极少，使得这两种潜在存在竞争关系的结构的生态位重叠度近乎为零。捕虫夹与花朵的空间分隔，或许是促成捕蝇草将节肢动物群落按营养功能与繁殖功能进行分区的原因之一。